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5 – Rodeo Journal Europe, March 28, 2008
GERMAN JAILBREAK !

We’re leaving the tight schedules of the Belgium part of the tour and heading out on our own for the German leg. First stop, Jena (pronounced yenna), to meet some folks from our new record label and reconnect with the up-for-anything Rodeo fans in Germany.

German Jailbreak, Day 1: Jena – Cobblestone Cowboys

After picking up our bare-bones rental van, Sugar hops up front and get us down the road and out of Belgium. We hit the first truck stop we see to load up on Fisherman’s Friend Sterke drops for the sick dudes (we’ve all acquired a taste for the most freaky tasting cough drops) and little bottles of mysterious brown liquor for Mason. It’s tradition. Country music is about tradition. Just look at the cover of our new album.

We’re driving through the boonies, mostly. As we get closer to Jena, the towns get smaller and smaller and we’re getting worried that we’re headed into a tiny Euro-hick town. Make no mistake, they got hicks out here. Going around the last hill, the whole city opens up with lights and rooftops and a giant glass tower coming up out of the center of it all.

Out in the rural east German hill country, 90 kilometers from the nearest town of any size, we are heading into a city of 100,000 people (or however many that is in the metric system). Right on.



The snow keeps coming down. It’s been rain and snow the whole trip. People are sick, we got dudes without warm coats, sliding all over the place on the cobblestones in our boots.

Seth, one of the owners of Gravewax Records meets us at the Café Wagner with his band, Cowboy Bob and Trailer Trash. Seth’s from Texas and lives in Jena with his girlfriend, Katja. Excellent folks. They show us around this very cool college town and on down to the bar where Seth works. Our first album is playing as we walk in. How thoughtful is that?

The show is just as hot as can be. The crowd is on the small side, but the room is beautiful. And it only takes one or two people whooping it up to really make the Rodeo happen. In Jena, we had 20 or 30 people who were ready to have a good time (on a school night) and it happened. We bought a bottle of Jack Daniels to kickstart the baptism and inducted just about everyone at that show into the church of the Rodeo.

After the show, Seth and Katja take us back out on the town for still more drinking. Down in the cellar of the Flower Power club it’s late and everyone is dancing, crunching their feet on the broken bottles all over the floor. Here in Europe, I’ve been in rowdy rooms that go into collective cringe mode when a glass breaks. At the Flower Power, you could sweep a table full of empties onto the floor and no one would give a shit. On the walk home, a walk I can’t really remember, we apparently stopped to take pictures.

German Jailbreak Day 2: Welcome Back to Berlin

Our radio appearance in Kassel is canceled so we boogie on up to Berlin for an extra day to hang out in the city. It’s a cool move to walk around being cowboys – to hype up the show at White Trash Fast Food the following night.

When we get into town, we meet up with White Trash’s booker, Trinity, one of many Americans who work at the club. Some of our German friends described White Trash as the place to go to “get your American on.” Anyway, Trinity not only helps find us a place to stay, she offers to let us play the club that night for dinner and drinks. She looked at our tired faces, probably imagined our empty wallets, and gave us a total hookup. If you’re reading this: thank you, Trinity, Johnny Falcon, Wolfgang and the whole crew at White Trash.


Lichtaart6 – Rodeo Journal Europe

German Jailbreak: Berlin, Day 2 – Wednesday, March 26, 2008.

I’m gonna have Mason write today’s piece because he committed a Howdy Don’t last night. He got drunk and fell on his face in the street where everyone could see. We’re here to represent, not come off like lightweights. Make with writing, Turbo.

Always nice to feel respected. Thanks, Brent.

Yeah, Wednesday morning I was feeling notso hotso. My recollection of last night was this: play a show, go get a few drinks to cool off, go to a new club, drink, go to a new club, drink, throw snowballs at cowboys, fall on my face, fast forward to the next morning and I smell like a recycling bin.

The snow was crazy on the Germany trip. Instead of proper snowflakes, it was coming down in these freaky little industrial-looking nodules. It was NOT normal. Everyone was commenting on it. Brent was calling it “global robot weather” and everyone was just nodding “ja” like he was exactly right.

Wednesday morning we all went out shopping for treats for our girls and for ourselves. We needed gloves and warm clothes. It’s been cold and if we don’t get some warm clothes on, we’re gonna get sicker than we already are. Ben spots an incredibly cool coat at a surplus store in the old East Berlin, specializing in Red Army gear. If you see him strolling around Seattle in a blue/gray canvas motorcycle jacket with Soviet-era epaulets and collars, that’s the one I’m talking about. Can’t miss it.

The shop owner was not your typical business man. He did not want to sell this jacket. He was asking some astronomical price, even after Ben talked him down a good ways. I have never seen a businessman work so hard to not make a sale. Must be a cultural thing. Anyway, Ben’s a gettin-shit-done sorta guy and after telling us to go ahead without him, he got his coat. God it’s cool. We’ll get some pictures up. You’ve got to see it.

Another thing you gotta see is Sugar’s new tattoo. Sugar and Scott made friends with a local tattooist and in a matter of hours, Sugar has the name of our second album, Howdy Do!, tattooed on his right arm in Japanese – just as it appears on the promo pressing of the CD. During that adventure, he and Scott “Big Molecule” Swayze have made a whole new set of friends who end up keeping Scott out so late that he doesn’t surface until we’re loading the van to leave town. Big Molecule is a friend-making son of a gun.

Wednesday night was the night of our big, well-promoted show at White Trash. In addition to the marquee in front of the club and Brent’s myspace wrangling, someone points out a small article in one of Berlin’s major magazines. The magazine has cool name: Zitty. Probably means “city,” but we had a lot of fun with it, anyway.

Out in front of the club, we find a line of people from the entrance to the nearest corner.

Bonkers show – people, noise, hollering, whiskey. It’s all getting to be a blur to me at this point with every set is starting to blend into every other set. Once I do the “one, two, one two three four!” count for the intro (I’m filling in on drums for Mr. Curtis Andreen on this tour) it’s like hitting “Play” on a CD. We’re on autopilot at this point, soulful autopilot.

After the show – more drinking, more clubbing. Quick aside: Just typing out that sentence I see that I’m starting to write the same way I speak to non-native English speakers. We’ve all started simplifying our English. That’s gonna go over gangbusters when we get home – it sounds like we’re talking to toddlers. “We go to store now, yeah?” “In America, I do music and day job.”

After the show, we hang out some more at White Trash. The place is like a huge Chinese restaurant-themed pinball machine with three floors, all connected by curving staircases. Later on, we let our local friends take us to their favorite places. A little confession: I dance in Europe. I dance to whatever freaky music the club is playing and I have a fucking ball. Dancing is considered to be a kind of Howdy Maybe by the band. I won’t name names (Brent), but I’m not alone in it. Maybe someday the Supreme Court of the Rodeo will determine whether dancing is a Howdy Do or a Howdy Don’t. Until then, game on. Plus, in Germany everyone dances so badly that I feel like John Travolta.

This night, we ran into the classic problem with girls trying to steal the hats. In one of the most serious moments, Brent comes running up to Johnny and me, excited and hatless: “We are at LEVEL ORANGE . The hat is gone! Hat Level Orange! ”

I spot Brent’s hat on the head of a pretty little girl on the dance floor. She doesn’t want to give it up nicely, so… This is something I’m not proud of… I have to wrestle it away from her. Additionally, I elbowed her face in the melee. Just a little elbow/face contact, I’m not a monster. I’d say she’s probably the prettiest girl I’ve ever elbowed in the face. Johnny delivers the necessary lecture and we put the ugliness behind us. When will people learn?

Moving on. Berlin at night is a great place to be. We whooped it up. We did the Rodeo proud. We showed the cowboy flag and we crashed out in our boots at sunrise.

German Jailbreak – Day 3: Thursday, March 27, 2008 – Berlin to Lichtaart

Still Mason, here…

In the morning, we shrug off the snow and pile into the van.  We grab onto Big Molecule and he comes strolling up the strasse –dude is fucked UP.  We make a few stops for pics and hit the road. SHOW BERLIN MORNING PICS

Caption: Dig Molecule, you can see how hard he’s trying to maintain. He could barely talk.

When scuba divers go from the crazy world of the deep and head up to the surface, they have to take their time to let their bodies acclimate to the change. The Rodeo is not so lucky. We had to hightail it from metropolitan Berlin to rural Belgium at maximum speed.

Everyone is operating on a couple hours sleep and we’re trying to drive fast enough that we’ll have time make it to Lichtaart in time to take a nap before tonight’s show.

After a 5-hour drive, we’re in Lichtaart, the tiny town where our rental house is located.

Everyone is looking forward to a nice little nap and a meal. We’re just dumping the bags off when our pal Robin from the booking agency arrives. Time to go. The collective groan from everyone was probably detectable by seismologists. I haven’t seen the dudes so bummed. Me included. I pride myself on being a trooper, but I was doing the “if I quit the band now, can I still get home?” math.

We arrive 3 hours before our performance at a small café in a quiet town. Ouch. That’s the Belgium-to-Berlin bends, for you.

We’re at a café that caters to the adult contemporary crowd. Picture women with dyed hair and men with Cosby Show sweaters. But as we get enough Duvels (strong local beer) in us and start talking with the regulars, we discover that these folks are alright.

We do our best to power up and put on a good show for the retirees in attendance. I’m sorta badmouthing this show, but I’ll say this: these folks bought more CDs and T-shirts than the all the cool kids in Berlin. A little old lady came up to Brent and requested “Sissy New Age Cowboy” by name. At the end of the night, she also asked him for a kiss on the cheek in exchange for buying a CD. He got into the van with a sad look on his face. “I lost a little chunk of my soul, back there.”